What is the best cloud application production infrastructure for me?

This is another exploratory post considering the way forward this year. Blogging is now core but still just one strand of a wider goal I've been pursuing for years.

I see blogging as conversation but also specification and wider thought. In the process of delivering a product or service I've found early discussion and collaboration to be essential. Blogging is the simplest way to do that.

I can easily try ideas out. Present them, get feedback and see what people actually use or engage in. It also allows me to pursue many different paths of though. See where they lead and develop the core concepts of an idea better.

The long term vision though is to produce media and programs ultimately leading to games and experiences. So the question today is what is the best infrastructure to support this. Now the web has become a utility and most products and services support it you can basically take your development and production process where ever you go and get the job done. At least you can if you pick the right tools and learn how to make them work in your workflow.

First I'll brainstorm my current thoughts to see what I already have in place or could put in place. See if this covers enough bases and look for holes in the idea. This should also give you more of an idea of what I am rambling on about.

Essentially I'm asking what is a good enough, or brilliant, development and production setup that works at work, home and out and about. Is there one or must I compromise and where?

What I want to do and how I currently do it

• Blogging: Blogger and Wordpress. Will move to self hosted wordpress early this year
• Unity 3d: code stored in github, Store output files in dropbox public folder
• HTML 5: code stored in github, developed and published through cloud9ide
• Content store: Dropbox public folder. Works on all devices, reliable and built for scale
• Distributed Versioned file store: for managing codebases. Use github free version.
• Learning tools: planning a self hosted moodle install
• Web server: PHP is the language I use the most and supports the most popular web software I'm likely to use
• Drupal, 
• Wordpress
• Moodle

The questions I have are many and varied and I'll answer them over time. Here are a few to give you can idea of where I am going:

1. Is there one host that would do all this? I don't think so and I don't think I would want it. Too much lock in. The hassle of so many different solution is balanced by the freedom to connect and switch them as needed. AWS or bitnami for example
2. Do web hosts support github these days or is ftp still the norm? github is so much more straightforward. Cloud9ide does it so well.
3. Is it possible to provide data and server side programming on a web host and use this as required in html 5 and unity applications? Seems a relative no brainer. Just haven't got round to it.
4. Is dropbox a good enough content delivery network (CDN)? Isn't designed for professional use but for now is it good enough. What metrics should I gather?

Creating this article has been useful already. It's helping me formulate what it is I'm actually trying to do and see that I do have most of it already in place or I know it can be done and how to do it. 

Essentially I feel we're entering a world where many parts of the infrastructure that support an application or experience are distributed. The networks and data rates are so good and reliable and the tools understand how to make it work easily enough. 

For example I think the way Tennis results are expressed isn't very good. I find it really hard to follow the tours as a result. All I need is a reliable source of results in a format I can reinterpret as requoired. Then I need tools to visualise this data in ways that help me follow the tour and understand the results better. 

That's just one example out of hundreds. The infrastructure you would need is 

Data provider

The web server provides and stores most of the data. Handling the following jobs:

• something to pull in the data, 
• turn it into a standard format 
• and store it. 
• Then supply it when needed. 

Visualise the data

 The tools to visualise the data include:

• HTML 5 developed and published within the cloud9ide editor or dropbox public folder
• Unity developed within the unity editor published in dropbox public folder

Both have excellent cross platform ways of sharing and visualising data. 

Content delivery network (CDN)

Dropbox hosts the media files for me including the unity files. It hosts images too. Not a good place for videos.

Youtube hosts many of the videos I share and some I have uploaded. 

Should this be my web server instead or is it best to keep these things separate?

Distributed Code Management

Git manages the code throughout the infrastructure and gets it where it needs to be. Currently using the free public version.

I'm asking questions like:
Which hosts support a git workflow?
Should my wordpress sites be under a git workflow?
My gut tells me not yet. Just get good WP hosting first so I learn what that's like. Get a separate git hosting elsewhere and when I'm ready combine the two some how.

For now I'm just surveying the scene.

My search returned plenty of results with people doing just this so it's possible.

• Workflow for working with git and WordPress
• you need .ssh access so VPS or a dedicated server is required.
• need a private git hub repository if you have premium wordpress plugins or themes.
• Keeping WordPress Under [Version] Control with Git
• example.gitignore file
• wp-content/uploads should you track it?

Graphics and image Editor

I'm using the pixlr editor app in chrome. So it is the same across all my desktops and does the basics I need for now. Mainly editing photos. Resizing them for web. Accepts photo urls as well as local files. Means I don't need to install a separate image editor on each desktop and maintain it. 

Gene Experiment

Here is another approach to exploring horizontal gene transfer

If you have created some simple bacteria in a virtual world like Unity3d. They don't have to be complex, just cells or even just spheres. Get them to move around a petri dish. They could have a nucleus and inside that they have genes as scripts. Each script has an effect like:

• glow in the dark
• turn red, green or blue
• get longer or shorter.

You can then selectively knock out these genes and see the effects over time on them and their offspring. You can mate the bacteria to see which genes are expressed. Just an experiment on genetics. Something to share and start the ball rolling. Save everything in json so anyone can use it.

I expect this has already been done elsewhere. If so great but most examples aren't designed for others to build on. That's the idea here.

• Unity is free to use
• the code required is relatively simple
• sharing the application and source code with others is relatively easy. 

Not only do you demonstrate the principles of genetics and gene transfer but you teach others that they can practice the principles of biology directly through digital research.

That is what really excites me about knowing how to program. I don't have to wait for my cell culture to grow. The only limit to what I can learn is my imagination. I can literally create my own laboratory and experiments whenever I wish. Fun :-)

The Plague and the benefits of Horizontal Gene Transfer

How do you express the concept of Horizontal Gene Transfer in a way most people could understand and also see where it could be useful?

In fact I have several related concepts and questions I think I can express in one idea:

• What is Horizontal Gene Transfer
• Is  horizontal gene transfer natures software update?
• Can viruses can do good?
• Can programming teach you about biology?
• Is biology built into programming?

These are the challengea I've been considering for a few years. One idea I like is creating an experiment to demonstrate the concept in a historical context. Once I understood Horizontal Gene Transfer I quickly started to wonder if this would be a simple answer to why certain people are immune to pandemics like the plague while others aren't.

The point is that anything that would help you survive the plague would be selected for in an evolutionary fashion. Even in the most deadly plagues and pandemics there always people who are immune and survive. It makes a lot of sense that if this immunity were the result of a viral infection then it could spread.

As long as the virus doesn't harm the individual enough that they don't survive then the virus would actually help people live when those around them would die. This would become a symbiotic relationship as long as the plague lasts. It would also encourage the transmission of the virus. Those who are immune would obviously become more common relative to those who are not immune. Stories of miraculous recoveries by being touched or in the presence of certain immune individuals would be abound.

Viruses survive because they can change the genetic code of the hosts they infect

This may sound fantastical but the concept is already in place and called active immunity. The individual themselves would produce the immunity. A related example is Sickle cell anaemia. It is dangerous and uncommon in normal populations but more common in places where malaria is prevent.

Sickle Cell Anaemia protects against malaria. So while normally it would be a bad condition to have but in an environment where Malaria is common is would be quite a benefit. So it demonstrates the principle of an affliction being an advantage however Sickle Cell is an inherited genetic disease.

All we are really talking about here is for nature to come up with a way of being able to transfer this condition to others. That's actually what viruses do. In fact it's how they live. Viruses survive because they can change the genetic code of the hosts they infect. Otherwise they wouldn't be viruses.

So that's the basic theory. A virus uses horizontal gene transfer and could infact do good instead of harm. Giving a species selective advantage. How to demonstrate this though, that's a fun challenge.

We have always known more about evolution and biology than we think. We just haven't appreciated enough different viewpoints. 

So the context is the plague. I'm obviously thinking of the great plague that affected Europe in the middle ages and came to England because I'm English. You pick your own similar story that interests you. The concept is most important.

Working in software is for me an advantage. I practice horizontal gene transfer on a daily basis so the concept and its application becomes quite straightforward once I'm in the right mindset.

The story I want to follow is of a cell or cells being attacked by plague bacteria. You must introduce a virus containing code to protect against the bacteria. Essentially an update to the cell code base. Now the exploit on the code has been fixed.

This explains in one example how a virus could protect us against infection and thus be beneficial. Not just harmful. And how our genetic code can be constantly updated through exposure to the world around us. Just like our devices and apps are constantly being updated.

I described how to translate this into software so this article is about putting context and story behind the techniques. Why you would bother to create this app and why Unity interests me so much as a development platform. You could do this through html 5 but I think it would be easier and have more impact through Unity.

Overall This demonstrates neatly my view that we have always known more about evolution and biology than we think. We just haven't appreciated enough different viewpoints.

Build a Virtual Body: Bacteria communicate with their hosts

This article Communication between bacteria and their hosts is the kind of thing I look for to support my dream of a virtual body. My interpretation is essentially simple.

I consider bacteria and viruses to be to the human body like plugins are to software. The body is an entire organism but in fact it's a symbiosis of multiple organisms that evolved together. These organisms are so interlinked they couldn't exist separately.

Normal evolution means that the body must continually keep up with the changing environment in which it lives. Bacteria and Viruses are simply natural means to facilitate these changes. Horizontal gene transfer is part of this mechanism and there is plenty of evidence that the organisms we host talk to each other. This is just the same as software and operating systems. They all talk to each other. Lots of tiny applications and scripts slowly get incorporated into software and ultimately built into operating systems. 

I simply see the same pattern happening in biology. In fact I feel that we are just seeing the normal processes of evolution occurring in digital fields as we have seen in the biological ecosystems. 

Immersive “Holodeck” Classroom with Leap Motion Control

I don't know about you but the Star Trek 'Holodeck' is such a fun dream that I get very excited when I see it start to become reality. That is what has happened at OHIO university where they have created an immersive "holodeck" classroom a leap motion controller. Using consumer grade tech like the leap motion controller brings this vision into our living rooms as well as classrooms. Essentially opening up the possibility that any room can become a holodeck or an immersive classroom.

What I like most is how the associated video presents the concept. It just makes sense. See what you think.

I'm slowly working towards an infrastructure and process that enables this. It is work and sharing like this that spurs me on because it shows that it is hear and now if you know where to look and who to talk to. Bringing this to education. That is my longer goal. It is nice to know I'm part of a much wider movement.

Learning is innate. How the changing world can help education

The evolution of learning is a fascinating topic. Learning is my strength because I was brought up to think that learning is innate and every challenge is surmountable. In fact learning is never really changing, only the tools and processes we use to learn will change. The education industry has been struggling to figure out how these new tools can help people learn.

I've never thought it's that difficult because learning is about the human process, the tools are just facilitators. I've been waiting for years for my employer the Open University to realise this. Listening to a 2012 HEA conference keynote by Martin Bean my CEO/Vice Chancellor excites me because he seems to get it. So much of what he says in this keynote reflects what I think. That is why I really like what is happening under his watch at the OU. I simply feel that all the new things we can do these days are simply what we have been waiting for.

The most sophisticated technology in the learning process is always the learner not the tool used to teach them. Learning is really just a case of getting information into a persons head and body and then helping them figure out how to use this information to get something done. You have learnt something when you overcome a challenge that you previously couldn't. That is how I see it.

Humans have an incredible capacity to consume information and get it into their brains. We have senses including eyes, ears and touch which we can use all at once. The quantity and quality of data these senses can consume is terrific. Newer tools are just making it easier to make full use of these senses. Humans are also able to combine their senses to achieve secondary or tertiary senses like proprioception and kinaesthetic awareness. It is now getting possible to speak to these senses through devices like the kinect.

The point here is that people will pay for the ability to overcome a challenge that matters to them. If you can make this happen faster and more easily then people will pay more. So, learning isn't really changing because humans aren't changing. They're just doing what they always did but with better tools and more support. So standards have risen, content is now cheap and the market is exponentially larger. Surely that is a huge opportunity.

What is needed is simply going back to the essence of learning and re interpreting existing content, tools and assessment methods in light of what is possible today. Surely we can make the learning process the innate, natural and easy process humans are designed for?

Many thanks to Jonathan Vernon (@mymindbursts) who inspired this post by sharing Are we at the Napster moment in HIgher Education. A thought provoking article.

Spore: Why it didn't work

A dream of mine is to create a game or piece of software incorporating evolution and cellular development. So I was very excited to read Spore: My view of the Elephant written by someone who actually worked on the game Spore. It is a highly worthwhile read. Capturing both the complexity of the task and also the lessons learned that doomed the project to failure.

Let me know what you think.

Launch is dead for free to play games

Recording a thoughtful timely article Launch is dead for free to play games I found through linkedin. I am now seeing my route to like minded people through providing content just like this post. I write a lot of stuff myself but also share good stuff from others.

I am finding it help me connect with people who have similar interests. From there I feel symbiosis will occur naturally in that other things I create like apps and tools will be useful to them and things they do will be useful to me.

Why only drinks that stimulate thirst are profitable

Why only drinks stimulate thirst are profitable has been re-produced at my new blog Cell Your Sole.

So I've had this niggling question for quite a while now. 'Why do most drinks available not quench your thirst?'. for along time I've been ordering a separate glass of water with any drink at a restaurant. In a club or bar I just accept that each drink is going to make me want another.

But why is this the case? Why is each drink so strong and often quite concentrated to make me need a separate glass of water?

I think the reason is basic economics. I don't think it's anything particularly sinister on the manufacturers or sellers part. The drinks market is very competitive and needs sales volume to turn a profit. So each drink must be sold in volume. I just think that it doesn't make sense financially to sell drinks that don't encourage repeat purchases because you won't sell many units of a drink that actually quenches your thirst.

This explains to me why the best sellers are coffee, tea, coke and many other caffeine related drinks. Caffeine makes you pee so you lose some of the water you drink with it. It's also addictive. So you feel the need for another. Chocolate is the same.

I expect that many drinks have been sold over time that do quench your thirst but very few of these have survived for this very reason. They just didn't sell in the volumes required. They were outcompeted by other drinks.  I don't see how drinks without elements that keep you coming back for more like strong flavours, addictive agents or diuretic properties can compete in this market.  It's these properties that produce drinks that won't quench your thirst because they're too concentrated with sugarand laced with diuretics and addictive ingredients.

The alternative is to price these thirst quenching drinks higher so you don't need to sell the volume but I don't think that sits well with consumers. Mainly because the drinks don't fit the expectations people have of higher priced drinks. They taste more like the simple drinks you'd have at home not expensive drinks for a special occasion.

This is just my opinion. It helps me accept these things for what they are. We may see this change in the future but I'm not holding my breath. Ultimately I'm saying that consumers are making the choices. Manufacturers and retailers have to sell products that make them a profit. to do this you need people regularly coming back for more. By definition that means you give them what they want instead of what they need.

The funny thing is, I think the exact same thing has happened in the food market. the same pattern and results for exactly the same reasons. Often food and drinks are seen to complement each other.

It's also why my approach is to make my body strong enough to be able to handle the food and drinks on offer. Instead of spending my time avoiding the delights on offer I prefer to believe our bodies can thrive with a little of these foods so longer as we maintain our true hunter gatherer roots. That is that we must hunt and gather which means move, play, search. Do that and you'll be able to do what you want when you want.

Adapt: Is there evolution in business?

For me the answer is a definitive yes. The more I apply evolutionary principles in thinking about business the more I see it fits and the more I feel I understand business. It's why I like capitalism. It's a very harsh approach, which I don't like, but then is'n't natural selection. Natural selection is about competing for energy and essential nutrients, capitalism is about competing for money and resources that help you get more money. So capitalism is a harsh game but it's important to understand it before you can learn how to thrive in it. If you can do that then maybe you can do some good.

This morning I heard Tim Harford talking about his book Adapt on the science weekly podcast titled how to achieve success through failure. In his book he applies these evolutionary principles and shows how well they can explain what we see in business. Through history and across continents the analysis stacks up. Now I haven't read the book yet, it's on my wish list, but I've been viewing business through evolutionary eyes for so long I feel I know what it will cover.

I wanted to show that it's not just me noticing evolution everywhere and feeling that this insight could help me survive in the world. I think it's why the silicon valley model works so well and it's what I do. I don't worry about anything I do being a perfect fit. I worry about adaptability and flexibility. A perfect product one year is often a flop or waste the next. The best products are those that can adapt enough to be relevant no matter the fashion.

Essentially, as Darwin summarised. It's not the best adapted that survive, but those best able to adapt.

How far does uni education need to change its practice in order to successfully deliver digital scholarship?

This is a big question.. I'm not going to answer it here, apologies. No, I recently attended a coffee morning asking that question. I'm just going to post my suggestion. It's about money. I know you'll think that's not really what is being asked and my answer is that unless you can pay for the idea you have then you're stuck. I don't see anything technically that can't be done. It's just what we can afford that matters. I want better research, better policy, better tools. I want the whole lot but unless I explain how I'm going to pay for it I won't get anything. Or I'll just have to accept what I'm given

If there's one thing I would do that doesn't seem to be getting talked about then it would be delivering a simple micro payments system that some one developing a solution to an educational need could plug into their project and thus monetise it. Removing the need to go begging for funding.

A major barrier to getting an idea out there is cost. We would support much more innovation if we could deliver ideas in the knowledge that monetising them was relatively simple. I've noticed how the business model of internet games such as farmville is based on micropayments. They have 80 million users and just aim to get £2-£3 from each. They've made the payment process so simple and the price so low that there's very little barrier to payment. If similar options were available to OU projects then more ideas could get off the ground.

I'd like a place or team I could approach that had expertise in monetising solutions that could advise and support the idea I have. This would provide a means to funding a project outside of current funding models. One that develops my institutions ability to attract paying customers and develop solutions customers will pay for. It also removes the barrier to innovation that I keep coming up against. That is, getting funding and the politics that are involved.

Education is an industry that's used to having a patron. Generally the government. It's used to being a public good. But I also feel that this protection from competitive forces has inhibited innovation. I feel that funding for smaller, seemingly insignificant projects is hard to achieve because the process of getting funding is so tedious and has no guarantees. You're also stuck with needing to demonstrate a given benefit. You don't have to go far to find a situation where the people who have the money don't believe there's a need in the first place. Now you're in a catch 22. 

So I just want the option to ask the customer directly. Would you pay for this. Give them paypal, world pay, mobile payments or which ever is appropriate or can be put in place. Let your customers decide what is worth paying for. So you focus on figuring out how to help your customers enough to make them want to pay. 

I'm kind of tired of these people who have money who expect me to justify why I should get it so I can help some one that they don't even know about. Why should these money men get to make the decisions. That's not exactly and open and fair way of doing things. If an idea is good enough and the team providing the solution can figure out how to monetise it then doesn't every one benefit?

On the origin of life

Image by pericomart(pericomart.blogspot.com) via FlickrI've had this idea floating in my head for weeks now. So I'm finally getting round to putting down into words. I'm excited to finally express it but I hope I do it justice. Here goes.

We're all aware of the theory of evolution. It makes perfect sense to me how pressure for resources has lead to so much diversity in life over such a long time. However evolution does not account or even attempt to explain how life began, the origin of life, at all. It merely explains why change is the norm and that life is about adapting to change. 

What I have come to believe is that life is basically about the exchange of energy. With this exchange we can fuel all sorts of processes that have built up over time to the natural world we are used to. It also powers the amazing senses with which we get so much pleasure.However the exchange of energy must lead to processes which ultimately bring more energy into the organism so that more energy can be exchanged and the cost of converting the energy into another form must be less than the energy gained from the exchange.

It's exactly the same as the environmental problems we keep hearing about. Right now it takes more energy to get oil and coal etc out of the ground and into our cars as petrol and homes as electricity than the amount of energy actually produced. So it's taking from the environment without giving anything back to balance things out. So it's unsustainable. This certainly happened in the early days of this planet. The atmosphere was very different and the organisms that found life there eventually killed themselves off because they changed the atmosphere. So what was good for us was bad for them but they only have themselves to blame.

With this example, it strikes me that life in itself appears constant. Organisms live and die but there always seems to be something that's alive at any given point in time. This may not have always been the case but it seems so now. So the organisms that have life are constantly changing but there is always something that has life and often the death or demise of one species is required for another to live.

Studying biology I am always reminded of feedback loops. That insulin and glucagon work together to regulate sugar supply in our blood and cells. If there's too much sugar in the blood your body releases more insulin, if there's too little it releases more glucagon. Adult onset diabetes occurs when this natural feedback loop breaks down because the bodies cells no longer respond to insulin as they used to. The feedback loop that corrects this naturally is that of activity (exercise). The extra demand for sugar in the muscles forces the body to become more sensitive to insulin again correcting the diabetes and bringing your body back into balance. 

These feedback loops are so common that it's easy to feel that they are the basis of human life and most of nature. Each organism is simply a collection of feedback loops that all, in theory, balance each other to maintain life. Death often occurs when one or several of these loops is out of balance for a long time. 

This thinking lead me to believe that life itself really could be one long feedback loop. For example if you don't reproduce, then your gene pool could die. With so many humans on the planet it won't have such an impact now but back when there were only a few humans on the planet this really would have mattered. But essentially for a species to survive then it must either never die or it must produce enough offspring to replace those that are lost. For a species to grow it must naturally produce more offspring than are lost.

So the feedback loop and pattern must repeat itself. It doesn't matter what the pattern is, just that it must exist. If the loop stops then another species may thrive in its place but if nothing does then death could become permanent. I would say that life is the presence of a pattern, death is the absence of one. For example many organisms might survive but not produce viable offspring. So the life was fleeting but the death far more permanent.

The question of why all organisms need to reproduce and then die instead of living infinite lives seems simple for me as a programmer. Any application I create is only perfect for the fleeting time that it meets the needs of the environment. It's guaranteed that within just a few years the very foundation on which it is built will be out of date and require reworking. You can maintain and fix the application for many years and get good service but sooner or later the cost of reworking it becomes greater than building a new one from scratch. I generally rebuild every few years for this very reason. hence I kill my old application and framework that my new one shall live. Each new version competes better than the last because I've learnt more and the environment it's built from and sits in can do so much more.

So I believe nature has the same problem and came up with the same solution millions of years before we did for essentially the same reasons. Every organism is built with the best technology of its day. Due to constant change this technology will eventually become out of date. Thus a pattern which ensures the species is built using current and different technologies is a pattern that ensures survival of the species at the expense of the individual.

So how did it all start?
Well, it's through learning how stars created the elements that I figured out my idea for how the early patterns of life emerged. Again, the process of tars creating elements is based on energy exchange, in this case entropy. The disorder that entropy creates matches the constant change we see today. This leads to energy, at the scale of a star this is sufficient energy to change hydrogen to helium and then helium to a higher element. This process went on for billions of years until all the elements we now know of were formed. Longer still and the planets formed from the the gas clouds the stars produced.

Each step is part of multiple patterns that lead to it, fueled by energy and change. The stars are part of a feedback loop. The gases in space are drawn to each other to such a point that their combined gravity and friction ignites a furnace so hot it creates nuclear fusion. Fusion actually releases more energy than is used to create it and thus it becomes a self sustaining process, only dependent on sufficient elements to fuse together. When these run out the furnace dies and the stars dies in a massive explosion. Hence a star has a life cycle of birth, life and death and it eats elements and excretes other elements. So, while it's basically a massive chemical reaction, it's also like us in very basic ways. It ingests food/fuel and excretes waste product.

So that's the feedback loop that created the elements, but where did life come from?
The next step is that the elements have a habit of bunching together. We already know that gas clouds form. Well, larger elements also have a habit of joining together. I don't know all the details but you'd essentially need to add energy to the elements to get them moving and joining together. Over long enough periods you'd get elements joining together that could create basic structures that could create more of themselves. All based on the exchange of energy.

I'm a bit vague on this but the basic idea would be that a very simple ecosystem could exist where some elements would join together. This would then release energy and waste products, protons and other things. This would encourage other elements to join together given this new energy and waste. Basically chemical reactions would occur. The pattern being that one reaction triggers another, which then triggers another until a loop occurs. If no loop occurs the pattern dies. But eventually a pattern or several patterns must have occurred that, like the furnace in the star, just found life and wouldn't stop. Again it's a very primitive life but it's a chain of chemical reactions looped together that balance each other and become self sustaining. 

I believe this would have happened away from earth, most likely inside a meteor. There it would be sufficiently protected from the elements of space but still bombarded with radiation. The radiation providing the energy to fuel the chemical reactions taking place inside. Over billions of years the life inside would have evolved dramatically. The original elements and chemical reactions being replaced by the waste products and new feedback loops(chemical reactions) evolved in their place. Newer more complex molecules and combinations of molecules could be produced and made available.

Now the question is, what were these elements?
At first I felt it should be viruses, because I feel they developed before cells were evolved to protect the DNA in the nucleus. Before that I wondered whether DNA or RNA was actually its own lifeform and viruses were simply forms of life that chose not to form their own protective cell wall. But now I'm not sure that DNA was first. Maybe life forms began but kept dying because they had no efficient mechanism for reproducing. DNA and RNA may have come along much later as an efficient means of storing the information to create life. I say this because I wonder where the cell wall came from along with mitochondria, organelles and everything else.

Where did it all come from? However I've just realised it could be its own answer.
All these chemical reactions could have occurred in a liquid inside a meteor. The cell organs could all have developed separately at first through basic chemical reactions as previously explained. They then benefit from each others presence and at some point find even greater strength by being encased in a cell wall and using DNA/RNA to store their data and replicate themselves.

All of this could occur in a meteor or on earth, that's beyond what I know. The point is simply that the constant supply of energy to fuel the chemical processes is what lead to all this. The constant change ensured processes that didn't end in some kind of loop died out. Those that did, flourished and encouraged further evolution of the elements available for life and the processes by which energy exchange could be created. So it became a self fulfilling cycle.

The original forms of life either adapted or died due to the new environment they created. That seems to me to be the essential fact of life. It's not always the species causing its own extinction, a meteor crashing into a planet breaking open its core would change the gases and elements available to the life forms and the energy that they're exposed to. Some life forms would die, others would manage to adapt and survive. In my view one or more of these meteors crashed into earth and delivered life forms with chemical reactions that ultimately changed the envrionment and atmosphere of this planet into what it is now.

We may find that these original life forms have all died out, or they may exist among us. This may even be where the cell wall became important. As a basic protection from the outside world. When I watch videos of life inside a cell it very much feels like a walled city with all inhabitants thriving on the inside, well protected from the dangers outside. Each organelle within the cell seems just like an inhabitant of a city with their own role to play, each contributing to the overall balance and productivity.

Anywho, I feel I've explained the basis of how I feel life may have begun. It may have taken a different route but I feel that the process involves energy sustaining repeated chemical processes. As life evolves it begins to actively search out energy which leads to predator and prey and food chains. Balance is constantly being sought because new life can be created on the waste of others but any balance that is achieved can be upset by any number of events. Death occurs when the patterns of life that produce energy exchange stop. We see this when the sun is blocked by a meteor crashing to earth and creating a huge dust cloud, or when all the food an organism uses for fuel gets used up.

It explains for me why crocodiles have hardly changed since dinosaur times. Essentially because they're so efficient with energy they feel no pressure to change, yet mammals who are so wasteful of energy feel constant pressure to change.

So if you feel I've missed something that's glaringly obvious, or just don't agree with what I'm saying then please post a comment. I've just put down what makes sense to me. I can't claim it's correct it just seems to explain so much to me.

I also like that it's essentially very simple. It says that the origin of life is in energy. Life exists when energy is being changed to a different form in a pattern that repeats itself over time. The presence of life inevitably changes the environment around it. Often to the point where energy giving processes become difficult. This creates pressure to evolve. Either existing or new organisms will find life and convert energy from the new environment that is created. This in itself is a repeatable process. one which must have failed on all planets except our own. Unfortunately it suggests that life has begun and died all around our universe. It may still thrive elsewhere, but to our knowledge this is still the only planet where the patterns of life have yet to stop running.

edit 12th november 2010
in Horizontal and vertical: the evolution of evolution I think they're arriving at some of the conclusions I have and in my post evolution is everywhere I've added to this concept further. 

False economies. Software development and pcs. Should you demand the best machine?

I've always wondered as a software developer whether a highered powered machine would be a good investment for the company I work for. Many purchasing decisions are made by accountants and sometimes managers with no input from the people who actually use the machines. They believe that a £400-£600 machine is fit for a developer and that it should be replaced every 5 years. Yet they're happy to pay a developer £35k  I think this is a false economy. Every day I'm at work I can only do as much as my machine allows me to do. It's the same as a farmer using a 10 year old tractor and combine harvester or a new one. You'd expect the new ones to cost a little more (given inflation) but also do a lot more work in the same time. 

I just thought I'd put a short analysis together and see if I can make the argument that it's actually more efficient to give a software developer a better machine because the return on investment will be huge.

I mentioned a salary of £35k. What does that mean per day? Google says there are 252 working days per year. £35000/252 = £139/day. so in a working week my employer will pay me £695(£139x5). I know these figures aren't exact but they're close enough and make the point. The most important tool I have as a developer is my computer. It's the equivalent of a chefs knife, an accountants balance sheet and a printers press. You don't give a chef a shabby knife do you. so why do I get a less than adequate machine. And why do I have to keep this low spec machine for another 5 years. 

Another thing I've noticed is that companies are happy to pay for photoshop licenses (£800 or so), they don't ask graphic designers to use gimp (a free open source product that's excellent but not quite so polished), they'll pay for xml spy for xml developers, for ms office for all, and shell out for ms project. All these products have annual license fees which they don't quibble about paying. I could get a much better machine just by reducing my reliance on these products. That's what I've done but no one has thanked me for it and allowed me to spend the difference on a better machine as a thankyou.

Yet no one considers the value that each item of software delivers is related to the power of the machine it runs on. Developers are the same as graphic artists. Many tasks are intensive. Even searching the code base takes a minute or so and I do that regularly. We get a machine that costs £400 and use it for 5 years. That seems to be the policy of many companies, £80/per year/machine. It makes no sense to me when we pay far more for just one item of software. 

Being a developer means my machine is my most important tool. It's the one thing I use for 7.5 hours a day. So I don't see why it's the tool we spend the least on. Particlulary when I makes specific choices to save money  in license fees for the company I work for. I don't use ms office or outlook, and I use many free but highly rated products.  

I'll stop there but now I've had a little rant I also don't feel like I'm being silly or selfish. The same policy applied where I used to work. It was no coincidence that I delivered sooner and to a higher quality after I fought for a better machine. I'm a software developer. My work is very different to the rest of the company. Therefore I require tools fit for my needs not theirs.

This isn't me just venting and wondering if I am making any points I could potentially take further. After this rant I see that I do have specific needs. I'm just asking for them to be recognised. 

Tennis Mania, so much potential but too many problems

hmm, I was really happy when I found the tennis mania application on facebook, I know.... sad, mainly because it has a really simple but addictive tennis game that works over the web and is free. Cool. I thought this is good for a laugh cos I'm a tennis fan and have been looking for a tennis game on the web.

What's better is that it's built around a community of 50k+. Challenging others and competing in tournaments is what it offers and I've been enjoying building my player up and playing. the downside is that i've just seen too many things wrong with it. Potentially seriously wrong like this error message

Fatal error: Uncaught exception 'FacebookRestClientException' with message 'Feed action request limit reached' in /home/tennisus/public_html/fb/class_facebook/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php:3017 Stack trace: #0 /home/tennisus/public_html/fb/class_facebook/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php(857): FacebookRestClient->call_method('facebook.stream...', Array) #1 /home/tennisus/public_html/fb/readstr.php(24): FacebookRestClient->stream_publish('is playing tenn...') #2 /home/tennisus/public_html/fb/index_live.php(11): require_once('/home/tennisus/...') #3 /home/tennisus/public_html/fb/index.php(9): include_once('/home/tennisus/...') #4 {main} thrown in /home/tennisus/public_html/fb/class_facebook/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php on line3017

As a software developer I can say that this is a seriously bad thing to let a user see.  I've just seen these kinds of errors one too many times from tennis mania. That's one problem but there are more. So what's a blogger to do? Write a blog about it and see if I can get them to listen. So here I go.

The next problem is spamming. Yep, I tried playing today and I couldn't until I allowed tennis mania to publish on my profile at any time without asking. I tried pressing no about 10 times until I realised I wasn't allowed to play until I allowed it access. I thought, 'fine, I'll just go into facebook and remove access'. So after I allowed access I played a couple of times. My wife then bitched that every single time I played a game, something like 10 games in 6 minutes, ok I was a bit bored, it appeared on my profile so she had to hide it. So tennis mania spammed my wall and annoyed my friends, consequently I've removed its access to my wall. But now I can't play tennis mania again.

hmmm. I'm stuck. I'm not going to allow it to spam my wall so if I can't play then I can't play. That's life. I really want to play but they've lost a user. I just don't know who to speak to, to get this fixed. Problem is that  it's made me wonder about how the aplication is made. I've put up with a lot of  problems with it because it's the only tennis game app on facebook but errors as serious as those I'm describing make me question what's going on underneath. The number of software and privacy errors I've seen indicates much more serious software and privacy issues underneath so I've started to wonder if they want access to my profile in order to sell my details. That may seem a stretch but the point is they've lost my trust. As a developer I know that seeing this type of error is indicative of poor and lazy programming. to see it as often as I have indicates this is endemic. If they're as slack with this then I wonder what else they're slack with. So my trust has gone and so has my faith that they're being honest with me.

Shame I'll just have to find another app. There are plenty. None of them are about tennis though. Boo.

Economic Hitmen

This video really did teach me something and make me stop and think.



I discovered the video after watching this equally interesting but funnier Dan the man video


and then checked out http://www.studiojoho.com/

In a world of abundance it's our time that's scarce

I've been reading so much recently about how new business models are being created around the idea of previously scarce things such as tv and music becoming abundant. So where once it was easy to charge for access to scarce content it's impossible to charge for content that's abundant. The market won't support it.

It makes every one wonder what the new business model will be. For me I feel that it comes down to the one thing that's truly scarce. Time. Each human has a limited time on this planet. What we each get to do with that time has limits for each generation. i see that each new generation expects to be able to do more with their alloted time than the previous generation. So the things you can really charge for are essentially around increasing the amount of time someone is on the earth. The health and fitness industries make billions selling this possibility.

Or you can help people get more out of the time they have. Get people where they want to go faster. Make their experiences more enjoyable or make it easier for people to get what they want.

So in a world where everyone everyone can learn. Tailoring learning to the person. figuring out how to give them what they want while also giving them what they need and making the experience more fun than others is an experience people are likely to pay for.

The other way of considering though is to think of how google did things. They connected peiple searching for things with those trying to get other peoples attention. They matched people as best they could and created organisation in the mess of search results. We trust google because their focus is on giving us the exact results we want given what they know about us. Advertisers love google because google shows their message only to relevant people and charge according to this.

For education I'd consider matching students with employers. start collecting a lot more information about people and use it only to help them. To find their perfect employer and vice versa. The money comes from the companies advertising for people and side products which users decide to buy such as extra storage or advice.

Learning: What would Facebook do?

Just  listening to Free: the future of a radical price by Chris anderson of the long tail. Making me consider how paid for education fits in with a market based on giving away most things for free.

I assume I'm not the first to consider this. Just thougth I'd log a few of the models that come to mind.

1) Provide and use free content. Charge for assessment and for tutoring time to enhance your understanding of the content and chances in the exam.

2)Provide basic free examinations including certificates with basic grading. Charge for more detailed feedback highlighting strengths and weaknesses and support in how to improve.

3) Make exams and content free, make it easy to share results and support. The way facebook enables entertainment and social life. Learning could be made easy, free and intuitive with one site where all learners and tutors can easily get together, have fun and learn at the same time.

Where would the money come? I've noticed how farmville in facebook  has grown to 80 million users because your game is built by obtaining objects. You either generate money in the game or recieve these objects from friends. Many of the most interesting and fun items can only be bought with cash. Often as little as £2-£3, the price of a pint or burger. Payment is just a couple of clicks and you'll get your item instantly.

The cost of delivering the game is so cheap and number of users so high it doesn't take much to turn a profit.

What if students were either on a learning version of facebook or in an app on facebook itself. They're learning and, answering questions discovering concepts. For everything they do they receive game money and experience points. and objects to use. Like access to virtual microscopes. Simple apps for their mobile phone. A free ebook. In a digital world there is no end of things that interest people that can be used as incentive.

I can see that I'm going into this example but I think it has potential. What if students earnt big points for taking on responsibility. they became the teacher for 10 minutes, an hour or a day. They earn the responsibility by gaining experience points and showing knowledge in a particular area. Maybe others suggest they become the teacher.

So as teacher they lead a group and teach them something. The group rates their teaching. The group gets a little reward as discussed above just for taking part and also rates the teacher. The higher the teachers rating the better bonus the teacher gets.

A key point I've just realised is that this is a way to get the students to also be the teachers. You no longer have to pay directly for lecturers. You can still have lecturers but they have earn the earn respect of the group and deliver what others actually want to pay for and follow. It's just the result of throwing the ideas of the new economy into the learning arena.

It's got potential because it massively reduces costs. Most of what you receive is cost nothing or very little. things such as bandwidth and servers are going down every year. What you're doing is bringing the models that have made Google,  Amazon and ebay so strong in so little time. Removing the middle man. Connecting learners to teachers and providing transparency in quality.

What you need to work on is ensuring quality learning gets recognised. Build tools that help you identify this.

In farmville you can build your farm as you want but start the same as evryone else. What if you started a course the same as everyone else. course items were available as you progress through the game and gain xp. Yet you can purchase them at different times and store and use them how you want.

From new economy rules such as those in What would Google do by Jeff Jarvis this approach does many things

• Gives control to the people, learners and teachers
• Makes education providers a partner of learners and teachers 
• Makes distribution easy. things can easily 'go viral'
• PUts focus on intelligent organisation. Just make it easy for learners and teachers to get in there and share
• Develops a gift economy: 
• Replaces scarcity with abundance
• Gets barriers out of the way. removes middlemen. Brings learners and teachers together
• Less control more trust
• New ethics: Make mistakes well: No teacher is perfect. Experts have generally learnt by learning from their mistakes. Learning to anaylse and learn from mistakes as a great skill. Rather than avoiding mistakes. Use it as a chance to learn. See the truth in the mess.
• Answers are instantaneous
• Simplify, Simplify: Just get peopel communicating. Remove all the barriers. If some one has problems talking help them. Find out ways to help them communicate. If they have trouble listening, help them too. An envrionment that's focused on communication and collaboration is a wonderful learning and teaching environment. The rest is just content. 
• Encourage enable and protect innovation. good art is innovative, it's new. The best engineering is innovative. encourage people to take chances with their learning. there are generally so many version of a correct answer but being able to find all those different answers is a skill in itself.

Tech Is Too Cheap to Meter: It's Time to Manage for Abundance, Not Scarcity

Just came across this excellent post by Chris Anderson of long tail fame. I particularly like the references to nature and evolution. I can't help but see that us humans are playing out evolution through what we produce. Scarcity leading to abundance seems a part of that.
http://www.wired.com/techbiz/it/magazine/17-07/mf_freer?currentPage=1

Evolution is everywhere

I'm quickly coming to the realisation that darwins description of evolution does not just apply to the natural world of eco systems but to the man made world too. So much so that it turns out I've written that evolution is among us before.

Energy flow

Every aspect of human life seems to reflect and embody evolution. I see this in financial systems where cash flow, particularly cash burn, determines survival in the same way energy flow and energy burn determine survival in nature. The point being that entities that burn cash faster than they generate it or bring it in, die. Surviving is about stopping this process and good healthy companies are judged by how well they manage their cash burn.

In nature the same applies. Healthy animals are those which manage their energy burn efficiently. It's likely the biggest reason that crocodiles thrived in both the dinosaur age and ours. They burn energy so efficiently they need to feed just a few times a year. Correspondingly they haven't had to evolve a great deal over the years. Implying the pressures on them to adapt aren't as great as on other species. Probably because they're exceptionally efficient with energy.

So I notice the same in man made life, for example the capitalist system functions well because it encourages the struggles of nature that lead to evolution and by encouraging evolution it encourages competition. Competition forces those involved to adapt quickly and figure out how to survive as the ecosystem adjusts and food chains form. Larger companies consume (merge or buy) smaller ones, parasitic and symbiotic relationships form. Some companies act like carnivores because every market has a company which lives off the wealth (fat) of the companies it consumes. The smaller scale still reflects nature if you accept that large organisms like mammals function like companies or corporations then their employees can be compared to the individual cells that make up the organism. Some cells act like accountants which is why every company needs an accountant and every accountant needs a paycheck. The paycheck for the accountant is much like the nutrient flow each cell receives.

In systems that are evolving you generally find that each new generation becomes faster or better adapted than the previous. That is how Giraffes evolved long necks, Cheetahs got so fast and Elephants got so tall though in truth, getting bigger, stronger and faster is one set of options. Getting smaller for example can be an advantage if you can squeeze through holes a predator cannot. Modern Humans are not escaping evolutionary pressures because modern tools and methods require that each human generation must produce more in their work to receive the same pay as the previous. This is becoming more so with each generation.

Ecosystems

The by products of these evolutionary leaps forward also create new food chains and feedback loops. Much as bacteria that lived off the initial gases in primitive earth. Their by products of carbon dioxide (C02) and oxygen (O2) created the atmosphere we know today. New organisms developed to live off these gases as a food chain and eventually lead to the vast and varied ecosystems we know today.

If you consider that human products such as culture, knowledge and economies are in themselves viable ecosystems evolving at pace. Then history shows us that as humans advance in culture, knowledge and capability we're creating greater and greater variety and flexibility. You see there are more financial products and solutions than ever, more technological solutions than ever and everything is becoming cheaper to achieve. The cash burn involved in creating complex solutions is so much less than it used to be because efficient and flexible solutions have evolved and found their niche.

Economies of scale

Evolution requires maintaining pressure for economies of scale. This pressure encourages organisms to develop symbiotic relationships with other entities to form a larger organism that fits the current ecosystem and targets a niche not already exploited.

Phew that was a mouthful but that's how companies of the 21st century are adapting. Many are taking the best solutions and combining them in different ways to attract customers by doing something faster, better and cheaper than others. Which is a classic case of evolution.

The old tools (organisms) have been subsumed into the new and the longer they survive together they more closely intertwined they may become. This is exactly how humans appear to have evolved, from single bacteria several billion years ago, to, essentially each human consisting of hundreds of billions of bacteria working together in a complex matrix. Joined together, in the whole, in symbiotic relationships formed over millions of years that balance each other to maintain the whole. The result being an overall solution capable of great flexibilty. With each individual bacteria (cell) benefiting from being part of the whole. Each specialist cell provides something the organism needs and overall the whole is so much greater than the sum of the parts.

Hardware and software

This is just how hardware and software is evolving. What used to be light emitting diodes (LEDs) that had a specific purpose on a circuit board to ensure electricity only flowed one way. Have now evolved into, and out competed, light bulbs where there is a need for a lightbulb with very low energy demands and high reliability. So LEDs have evolved because they found a niche and out-competed lightbulbs. They have done this so well in fact that they're now in many of the best torches and used in every light that tells you whether a device is on or not.

Most software is based on a set of libraries or applications that used to survive on their own. Time has passed and with it expectations have risen leading to competition. What was plenty then is only sufficient now. The market (ecosystem and food chain) has settled on it's preferred options in each solution chain and the other companies and their solutions have since died a natural death. Their components have been dissolved back into the ether. The basic elements are now working in other software and being given a new lease of life reflecting natures cycles of life, death and rebirth.

Engineering evolution

I'm fascinated by this topic because evolution is age old and it seems that everything man made is simply an extension of this age old principle. I could go on further. However I can also see that this realisation can help us in other ways. The difference between nature and ecosystems that we are part of and those we have made. Is that we understand so much more about those we have made specifically because we've made them.

We know

• how, when and why the financial systems evolved, 
• how markets have come about. 
• Why economic policies have been put in place. 

If these solutions reflect nature then it seems logical to use reverse engineering principles to understand the nature we don't know so much about by using that which we do. Kind of like engineering evolution.

My fascination in life generally centres around the amazing technology that all humans have, just because they're human. That is their minds, bodies and souls. We generally overlook the fact that we are still far more technologically advanced than anything we, as a species ,have ever created. Yet it amazes me how little most of us really know about ourselves. How little we know how to get the best out of who we are and what our genes give us. We're all in a constant battle to survive. We're still subject to these forces of evolution imposed on us and also by us and this struggle so often distracts us.

What I see is that any tool is really only the sum of the craftsmans skill to use that tool and his inherent talents. Talents being natural features such as number and length of limbs, skills being learned techniques such as running, jumping and dealing with pressure.

I meet so many people who are absolute experts in the tools they use for work and pleasure. I'm always aware just how capable these people are when they put their mind to achieving an end with their favourite tool. How much time and effort they will happily spend in achieving their desires with that tool. Whether it's a computer game, writing a book or amazing software. When people really set their hearts and minds to these ends they invariably achieve them.

I then wonder what would happen if we began putting our minds to really understanding how we work in mind, body and soul. That's my passion. My path is about finding out how we work and using that knowledge to evolve my skills and the way I live my life. To use my gifts with skill and achieve so much more as a result.

I started this path years ago with a passion for sports and sports science. Mainly because sport is about competition and thus evolution. True enough, over time all sports have evolved and been subject to natural phenomena. The floods of cash in the premier league and many other sports have changed these ecosystems just like earthquakes, eruptions and floods changed natural worlds.

Other sports and the species of sports people involved have suffered because they can't compete in the new food chain. This is forcing innovation to survive and brought about innovations like 20 20 cricket and lottery funding among other things.

Evolving code

What is really exciting me now in my journey exploring evolution is the realisation as a software developer that the invention and success of binary code running in all computers everywhere could give us fundamental knowledge of our own binary code, DNA. This means that DNA is binary and works like software. As a coder I learn the patterns that get the best out of binary, though I've never worked on binary itself, I work several layers above but I create objects, manipulate them, Save them to databases and write functions optimised to be run a thousand times while efficiently using all the resources available.

You will notice how this sounds a lot like the way DNA works. Here is the same chain of events but explained the biological, DNA world. DNA codes for proteins which become enzymes. Each enzyme has a specific signature and function. It's designed as a function to be run millions of times using the least amount of energy and resources possible. Evolution has just been helping us write a very efficient and flexible genetic code.

Ultimately, just like human software, nature gives us a system, through DNA and genetics, to share code with others and copy from theirs.

The process of horizontal gene transfer is becoming more widely understood and describes a process whereby we could actually evolve without sex. My understanding of this process began when I asked can viruses do good? The idea that viruses are all bad makes no evolutionary sense both in genetics and in software. Why would we be so easy to infect if we didn't also gain important abilities that help us compete. It's far more logical that we have only studied those viruses that cause us harm while possibly ignoring those that do us good. For much the same reasons that newspapers only report the negative. We survive because we worry and our worry helps us focus. We compete better because we address what's holding us back and disease is obviously holding us all back.

That's the age we're in right now. One where disease and poverty are being conquered to the point that many but not all live without major experience of poverty or disease though bothare still rife and a major concern. My firm belief is that our in depth understanding of all the technology (hardware, software, policy, infrastructure , organisation etc) can and should be used to understand ourselves more than we currently do. I find most people know more about everything around them than they do about their selves. They can predict the results of football games and fix their broken computer. All because they spend so much time and effort on both. Yet they can't predict the diseases they'll suffer from and prevent them or fix a broken lifestyle.

A virtual world

The solution I would love to see evolve is a suite of tools that describe basic life processes through application programming interfaces (APIs) and software. They allow us to learn about ourselves using virtual organisms. Learning how to get the best nutrition by say watching the nutrient levels of a virtual apple as it grows on the tree, is picked, sent to market, brought home and stored, prepared, eaten, and finally digested. The question being, how much of each nutrient actually ends up in our bodies and benefits us. Is there plenty to go round? Or is there only just enough for our body to survive. Providing this as a virtual model where all possibilities could be explored would be a wonderfull learning tool to help you understand how and why you should eat to be strong. It puts us in control of ourselves through greater knowledge.

The first generations of modelling tools such as this should give way to tools which model more complex systems by combining the models that have gone before. The speed of current development and amount of knowledge already available should ensure we step through these generations very quickly.

Ultimately I find a huge symmetry in our man made evolution and our natural evolution. The understanding of one greatly enhances the understanding of the other. The more we learn about what we produce and how we produce it by being entertained, producing things and getting involved. The more reference points we have to understand ourselves and explore models about ourselves. The more we understand ourselves the more we perfect and lead the lives and lifestyles that fit the individuals that we are. In the end we find our place and learn to enjoy it and thrive.

That's quite a dream I know. But I'm inspired because I can see the current path from A to B which means I can see it working and being worthwhile. My only consideration  is how quickly we will get there.

I see that software and hardware developers are best placed to understand the workings of humans because software developers work on code. This code makes use of the machine code provided by the operating system (OS) and also becomes part of the code of the individual computer. Much like each biological process can ultimately be traced back to it's DNA code that triggers and facilitates it. So software developers may have the keys to truly understanding our genetic code. I think genetics and software development are already starting to talk to each other in this regard.

Code lifecyles

I explained a theory I have on the influence of genetics and lifestyle on ageing. To bring this idea back to software I'd say that we slow down and have more issues as we age in much the same way that any windows based pc gets slower over time and use. Mainly due to its internal registry becoming cluttered through use. I've seen windows systems that never had a virus and always ran quickly because the owner knew how to take care of a windows based operating system. He rarely even had to reboot it. Yet most pcs run slower and slower every day because the owners have neither the knowledge nor the inclination to maintain them well and interestingly our bodies work the same way. With the right knowledge and lifestyle we can let our bodies fix the normal day to day damage. Without it we just build up problems until they're just too difficult to fix.

To make this clearer watch any premiership (That is English football but the sport doesn't matter the pressure does so Baseball and American Football have the same effect) manager before they take a job, just after they're fired and then a year or so when they've had time to recover The first is how young they are. The second is how they've aged ten years. Then when they've left the post and recovered they look much younger again. This shows a cycle I see regularly. The pressures of life can take their toll. Western life often ignores the processes of recovery and proper maintenance. The difference between a computer and a human body and mind is that you can get a new computer or you can reinstall the software every year. You can not do either with a human, so the only option we have is to become masters of our own bodies.

The artificial life community are already building models of living organisms. They haven't focused specifically on humans yet but my hope is that soon it will be possible to do so. Hardware developers are also well placed to understand the physical aspects of the products of genetic code because they understand how complex infrastructures are built and optimised. Biomechanics and other areas are also bridging the gap between man and nature and this understanding is now showing great potential to help humans do more with less in all sports.

Education: evolving the mind

Maybe the final piece of the puzzle is in our minds because The way we think often determines what we achieve. Sport reflects life in that we compete in sport in much the same way we compete in life. Football managers are only as good as their last few games, so they can win world cups or champions leagues but a poor run of losses can quickly see them sacked.

Our lives are all headed toward more openness and less privacy both professionally and personally. Sport is where everything is open already. Where stakes are always on the line. It's why we should see sports science as a study of human excellence under pressure. I also wonder where we'd be if all knowledge and skills were easier to share? what if we viewed education as lessons in overcoming challenges.

Business would realise real competitive advantage by embracing the lessons of sport science early. Using biomechanics to educate workers on how to lift heavy items without developing debilitating back problems. Back pain is the leading cause of days off sick and sports science is best placed to explain why.

Interviews are pressure situations where you're expected to perform, just like exams. Sport is built around pressure. Those who thrive on pressure do well. Sports science teaches us so many ways not just to survive in tight situations but actually thrive.

This current economic downturn is terrible for those seeking security but wonderful for those whose mentality thrives on uncertainty. The best in sport can thrive whatever the situation. If they want to win, they do. Sports science studies this. Why aren't we putting this knowledge to use in rebuilding our economy?

Sports science is important because it covers all aspects of being human. From physics and chemistry to biology, psychology and sociology. History too. My degree also covers business and I saw the symmetry all the time. The uptake and provision of sports science has increased exponentially in the last few years. Hopefully that means there are rising numbers of people with the knowledge of how their body works and this will start raising the standards and expectations for everyone. As a base of knowledge increases it then becomes possible to discuss more advanced concepts and make more use of the knowledge we all have.

The point being that many of the illnesses we suffer from still such as heart attacks and cancer seem to be encouraged by our lack of understanding of our basic make up. Essentially they seem preventable but highly common. We just need to maintain our strengths to live long and prosper. You can then see why tools and processes to make learning these easier, moe intuitive and fun are key to stopping them.

I also see that concepts that can be reduced to equations often receive a lot of weight and respect. So I made a very small effort at summarising darwins concept of evolution using Einsteins equation for relativity, Evolution of knowledge as e = mc2. It's a simplistic approach but it's intended to make you think and encourage debate.

Adding it all up

In summary I started this article with the idea that evolution is everywhere so I hope I've showed just that. Personally I find that everywhere I look I see the influence of evolution. I've then gone on to postulate that we're evolving as a species in a way that only humans can, through culture and social systems and man made technology.

I suggested that we now have the knowledge and tools to understand ourselves fully, simply because we've built our technology and systems from the ground up. Human products seem similar in so many ways to the organisms that nature produces. So the principles of re engineering seem perfect for the study and learning of who we are and how we work.

I've then looked at a lot of the ways we're already doing this and suggested we build more games, models and simulations that enable us to learn interactively using our senses and learning potential more fully than previous teaching methodologies have allowed.

I mention horizontal evolution in this post. I'm excited because I'm hearing more and more about it. I've just heard in Horizontal and vertical: the evolution of evolution that horizontal evolution may, as I've felt for a long time, have more of an impact than vertical evolution. Primarily because it allows an organism to adjust to its environment during its lifetime. This follows Darwins ultimate principle that it is those most able to change that ultimately survive.

Evolution is everywhere because you can see this happening in all industries and walks of life. Companies copy from one another either openly through opensource projects or other approaches or privately by hiring staff from key competitors and such. Either way we can see life evolving around us for the same reasons and using the same principles as we've first identified in biology.

The evolution of law and civil liberties. From Magna Carta to American Constitution 

Signing of the Magna Carta stands as a powerful act putting into law changes affecting the civil rights and liberties of common men.

The Great Charter agreed to by King John was part of a movement in both England and Western Europe to restrict the powers of the monarch and assert the rights of the politically influential, i.e. the nobles. The Magna Carta laid the foundation for government based on the rule of law in Great Britain 

Magna Carta: Cornerstone of the U.S. Constitution

Centuries later the American Constitution is heavily influenced by the work of the Magna Carta

Magna Carta exercised a strong influence both on the United States Constitution and on the constitutions of the various states. However, its influence was shaped by what eighteenth-century Americans believed Magna Carta to signify. Magna Carta was widely held to be the people’s reassertion of rights against an oppressive ruler, a legacy that captured American distrust of concentrated political power 

- Magna Carta: Muse and Mentor

In fact it is always surprising to learn just how much ancient changes affect and benefit us today both for good and bad. Another example is that the european union use Metric weights and measures primarily due to Napoleans rise in power in Europe during the nineteenth century. Two centuries later and even the UK is largely metric though we measure distance mainly in miles while the United states still use imperial metrics and suffer with the complexity that non metric systems require.

Further Reading

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Evolution among us

To explain the things happening around us I like to learn from history. I feel so many lessons of past ages can still be applied today and tomorrow if you yake the time to apply them properly.

What older lesson is there than that of evolution. It's always applied to the context of biology and how we have arrived at this current juncture.

Well, I like to see evolution as a tool of analysis and apply it to more than biology. To juxtapose it against revolution. When I do I see that we're evolving on a global scale in so many ways. Our judicial and financial systems grow to adjust to the increasing globalisation and amazing technology that's now prevalent.

Evolution describes mass extinctions as environments and ecosystems change and the creatures and food chains that depended on them are replaced by news ones adapted to newer ways of life.

Archeologists are coming to accept that dinosaurs died out over hundreds of millions of years as multiple changes to the environment occurred that they couldn't adjust to.

Yet crocodiles and frogs apparently survived unscathed. They were bult to survive. What's special about them?

We aren't completely sure but in the case of the crocodile their cold bloodedness which allows them to survive almost a year on just one meal would be distinct advantage against warm blooded creatures that typically feed every day.

The relevance to legal and financial situations such as markets for me is that all the models on which these and all other systems depend relate to the environments and in effect ecosystems that they have been designed to support.

Well, there have been so many political, ideological, technical and social changes throughout history, particularly in recent years, that the environment that everything exists in is just changing so fast its threatening to change ecosystems faster than they're able to adapt.

Entire markets such as software and hardware are based on business models that now, with open source and cheap production methods, seem archaic, even anachronistic. For me it truly feels like we're entering an exciting new era simply because the people can adjust faster than the organisations and policy so the naturak order and food chain can't keep up.

By food chain I mean large markets with entrenched monopolies. The holes in the old business models are becoming ever so apparent and the jsutification for the status quo is constantly challenged.

Just like the large swathes of private land that were given over to the public in the uk around the 1900's. Land which was once off limits to only a few but is now open to all to enjoy. Closed markets such as the phone industry, news and others are now being opened up, and barriers to entry are changing.

This means a different food chain and natural order is emerging and it's totally fascinating being around to see it happen. Mainly because things are so open now

Take gadgets for example. New scientist describes evolution of gadget design. The independent did their own take on gadget evolution.